Cemetery Archives - Lost In Michigan

The Dead of Spring

Posted on March 24, 2021 by Mike Sonnenberg Posted in Cemetery .

It is that time of year when the snow is gone and it will be a while until the trees have green leaves. March and April is always a challenging time of year for me. Nature is dormant and it makes it difficult to take nice looking happy photographs. My favorite time of year is when Autumn leaves are at their peak color. Early spring is my least favorite. At least in the winter fresh white snow hides the leaves that have died and fallen to the ground. I still like to travel and explore but I tend to post pics that are black and white since nature is mostly devoid of color.

This pic is from the old Port Crescent Cemetery hidden in the woods not far from the state park near Port Austin. I am looking forward to spring flowers but we gotta get through the April Showers first. Thank you for taking the time to read my posts and I hope you enjoy them even if the next few weeks are gonna be a little drab and dreary.

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Captain Walker’s Branded Hand

Posted on February 6, 2021 by Mike Sonnenberg Posted in Cemetery, people .

Near the entrance to Muskegon’s historic Evergreen Cemetery is a monument with the words Captain Walker’s Branded Hand carved into it. It also has a hand with the letters SS carved on it. It is a rather curious stone obelisk and begs the question, Why was his hand branded and what does the SS mean?

In 1799 Jonathan Walker was born in Harwich, Massachusetts where he learned to sail fishing vessels. By the 1830s he moved to Florida and sailed ships as a railroad contractor. Disgusted with slavery in the south he aided several slaves in escaping by sailing them to the British West Indies where slavery had been abolished. On his voyage, Captain Walker became gravely ill. His crew not as adapted to sailing allowed the ship to be captured where Captain walker was taken to prison and chained to the floor in a small dark room for months. After his conviction, he was sentenced to be publicly branded and thrown in prison. Captain Walker had the letters SS branded into his right hand which indicated he was a slave stealer.

After five years in prison, he was released when northern abolitionists paid for his freedom. After his release he toured the northern states giving lectures on the evils of slavery and proudly showed people his branded hand. Eventually, he moved to the Muskegon area where he died in 1878. He was laid to rest in Evergreen Cemetery and a monument was erected in his memory still stands in the entrance proudly showing visitors Captain Walker’s branded hand.

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Autumn Cemetery

Posted on October 31, 2020 by Mike Sonnenberg Posted in autumn, Cemetery .

I was out roaming the backroads around Lakeview and I came across the old Dickerson Whitsell Cemetery. Maybe I am a little strange, but I think these old cemeteries with their ancient headstones are beautiful. It is especially nice with a blanket of freshly fallen leaves. I was not able to find out any history on the old cemetery, but I do find it, and other old graveyards fascinating. I think you can get a good sense of the history of an area by the graveyards of the people who settled in the area years ago.

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Mt Pleasant Indian Cemetery

Posted on October 26, 2020 by Mike Sonnenberg Posted in Cemetery .

Northwest of downtown Mt.Pleasant is a quiet little cemetery. The historical marker standing in it reads:

In the 1850s, the Methodist Episcopal (Indian) Church established the Bradley Mission School and Indian Cemetery in this area. The cemetery served the mission until the late 1860s. Only a few grave markers are visible, and it is not known how many Indians are buried here. The best-known Indian buried here was Chief Shaw – Shaw – Waw – Na – Beece (1817-1868). As leader of the Saginaw Swan Creek and Black River Band of Chippewa, he signed the Treaty of 1855, which set aside six adjoining townships of land in Isabella County for his tribe.

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Salem Walker Cemetery

Posted on October 19, 2020 by Mike Sonnenberg Posted in autumn, Cemetery .

The Salem Walker Cemetery is a historic cemetery west of Northville. The first burial in the Salem Walker Cemetery took place in 1834 after the land was donated by Ira Ham and early settler. I don’t have any spooky stories to tell about it, I just thought it looked beautiful blanketed in the freshly fallen autumn leaves.

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Pere Cheney Cemetery

Posted on October 12, 2020 by Mike Sonnenberg Posted in Cemetery, Haunted Places .

I visited the Pere Cheney cemetery several years ago when I started Lost In Michigan. I happened to be in the area so I figured I should stop by and see how it looks since I visited last. I was happy to see a stone monument near the entrance with a little bit of history of the town that is now gone. I also saw a lot of coins and trinkets left by visitors so the old remote and secluded graveyard must receive a lot of visitors.

The town of Pere Cheney was started in 1873 by George Chaney about 15 miles southeast of Grayling. The town’s population grew to about 1500 people but two epidemics of Diptheria in 1893 and 1897 killed most of its citizens.

Most of the headstones in the cemetery are gone and of the few remaining some have toppled over or been vandalized. The tallest monument in the old graveyard is for Frank and Frances Barber’s children.

Hattie, Ray, and Roy all died in December of 1893. That must have been a terrible Christmas for Frank and Frances and the entire town of Pere Chaney as death swept through the northern Michigan town.

If you want to know more about Pere Chaney you can see my post about the infamous town HERE or in Volume 1 of my Lost In Michigan book series where I give detailed information on how to find the Cemetery. You can order them from Amazon HERE

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Michigan’s Remote and Secluded Cemetery

Posted on October 2, 2020 by Mike Sonnenberg Posted in Cemetery, upper peninsula .

I have visited a lot of cemeteries in Michigan doing research and the Holy Angels Cemetery on Sugar Island has to be one of the most secluded cemeteries in Michigan. The cemetery is also known as Payment Cemetery because many of the people buried in the old graveyard were from the nearby town of Payment. Michael G. Payment started a settlement on the shores of Sugar Island in 1845 and traded with the local Indians. In 1853 Bishop Baraga started a church that still stands today. You can see my post about it HERE

Behind the church, about 200 yards uphill, is the old cemetery. It was a somewhat difficult hike up a rocky path and I imagine it would be challenging to get landscaping equipment back there. The cemetery has a lot of tall grass and ferns growing among the tombstones and wooden crosses marking the graves of people laid to rest decades ago.

If you want to visit this burial ground you have to take a ferry to the island then head over to the church then hike up the hill to reach it, so yeah, I think it is one of the most remote cemeteries in Michigan.

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Michigan’s Strychnine Serial Killer

Posted on September 25, 2020 by Mike Sonnenberg Posted in Cemetery, Murders .

In a quiet rural cemetery southeast of Fife Lake in Springfield Township’s Clark Cemetery are tombstones for Gertrude and John Murphy. What is not carved into Gertrude’s marker is the name and death of her three month old baby that she is holding in her arms when she was buried. Ruth Murphy was being watched by her aunt Mary McKnight when she suddenly died in the summer of 1903. Shortly after returning home, Gertrude died. Mary McKnight was John Murphy’s Sister who came to live with the Murphy’s on their farm after her two husbands and three children died.

About a week after the funeral for Ruth and Gertrude, John died after suffering from seizures and strand contractions of his muscles. It was a local doctor that thought the description of John’s death seemed peculiar and reminded him of what he learned about strychnine poisoning while in medical school. John and Gertrude’s bodies were exhumed and their stomachs sent to the lab at the University of Michigan where traces of strychnine was discovered.

Mary was tried and convicted for the death of her brother and sister-in-law. The early 1900s trial was a media sensation with newspapers reporting on it nationwide. It is believed Mary was responsible for about a dozen deaths making her one of the first female serial killers in the nation. Her motives for the killings are still being debated. Author Tobin T. Buhk has written a book about the infamous murders titled Michigan’s Strychnine Saint: The Curious Case of Mrs. Mary McKnight. It is a fascinated true crime book detailing the story of her crime and life in Northern Michigan at the turn of the century. If you like true crime books I highly recommend reading it. You can read a preview of it on Amazon HERE

P.S. Her family believed she murdered her victims because she enjoyed attending the elaborate funerals of the period.

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The Stone Chapel in Clinton’s Cemetery

Posted on August 15, 2020 by Mike Sonnenberg Posted in Cemetery, Churches .

This beautiful little stone chapel stands among the headstones in Riverside Cemetery in the southern Michigan town of Clinton. The historical marker next to the chapel tells a little bit of its history and reads:

This chapel, completed in 1913, embodies the dream of Cemetery Superintendent George Kies, the design of Clinton-born architect Wirt Rowland and the artistry of the mason, a “Mr. Uhr” of Manchester. It also reflects livestock dealer Solomon Tate’s sense of color and design. Tate chose the stones, donated by local farmers. The Clinton Culture Club, later the Federated Women’s Club, led the chapel building effort.

Early in his long career in Detroit, Clinton native Wirt C. Rowland designed this chapel, which reflects medieval inspiration. Wirt Rowland (1878 – 1946) worked for George D. Mason, Albert Kahn, and other leading Detroit architects. He is best known for designing three Detroit skyscrapers, the Buhl Building, the Penobscot Building, and the Guardian Building during the 1920s, while employed by Smith Hinchman & Grylls. These buildings defined the Detroit skyline for almost fifty years

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The Michigan State Park Cemetery

Posted on July 16, 2020 by Mike Sonnenberg Posted in Cemetery, Michigan State Parks .

This old forgotten cemetery sits up on a hill not far from the parking lot for the Hamlin Lake beach in Ludington State Park. Long before the area was a state park it had a sawmill town called Hamlin. It was founded in 1852 by lumberman Charles Mears. He built a wooden dam on the Big Sable River and the town continued to prosper until the dam broke in 1888.

I shared this photo as part of a presentation about a year ago and it was after that an older gentleman came up to me. He told me that he was a ranger at Ludington State Park in the 60s and that an old coffin had washed up onto the banks of the Big Sable River near the mouth at Lake Michigan. From the age of the coffin and corpse, they figured it was someone from the old town of Hamlin who was buried next to the river. He told me they re-buried it in the old cemetery on the hill. I have never been able to confirm the story with a newspaper article but I have no reason to doubt what he told me.

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